Borat film review

certificate_15

BORAT

Sacha Baron Cohen looks set to have an even bigger success with his second film than he did with Ali G Indahouse. Borat (full title: Borat: Cultural Learnings of America for Make Benefit Glorious Nation of Kazakhstan) is the year's funniest film. Most viewers are probably going to want to watch it at least twice, as their laughter the first time around is likely to obscure much of the soundtrack.

From the opening scenes which show us Borat's supposed village in Kazakhstan (highlights include his sister, the country's fourth-best prostitute) to his trip across the Atlantic with his ursine producer Bagatov (Ken Davitian) in order to make a 'reporting' about the United States, the movie rarely fails to be anything less than spectacularly hysterical.

Baron Cohen takes a major swipe at the US in every scene and it's astonishing that he comes out alive. His initial attempts to make friends in a subway train are met with hostility bordering on physical aggression (Borat being Borat, he decides to calm the situation by releasing his pet cockerel in the carriage). He naively asks a group of street youths for fashion advice, attempts a bizarre version of the Star Spangled Banner in front of a rodeo crowd who boo him off the stage, and manages to convince a bunch of fervent evangelists that he is not only saved but speaking in tongues.

Everywhere he goes, calamity follows, not least if his bedraggled producer is in tow: their naked wrestling match proving to be the film's comic highlight. Even Pamela Anderson gets in on the act as the object of his cross-country affections.

Right wing evangelical Americans will be mortified and outraged: exactly the response Baron Cohen is looking for (and deserves). One can only hope that the more tolerant sections of the biggest power on earth may just realize that although most of this is largely exaggerated, their country faces becoming the butt of the rest of the world's jokes.

The film's slim running time, not usually a great sign, is also one of its strengths: it's hard to laugh non-stop for ninety minutes. With regular Curb Your Enthusiasm director Larry Charles at the helm it's not only a masterpiece of character comedy, but of comic timing.

Paul Hurley